LIVE FROM DENVER: Some Preds “Draft Facts”

While I wait for my connecting flight to Minnesota — and you wait for the NHL Draft to begin — I figured it’d be fun to give you some historical facts regarding the Nashville Predators and the annual summer event.

* Speaking of that, with the exception of 2000 and 2002, there are representatives from every single Predators draft class in their history on the current roster. Now that’s impressive.

* Nashville had a league-high 15 of their own draft picks on their final 2010-11 NHL roster. By contrast, the Calgary Flames had the least (3).

* In every odd-numbered draft year (except 1999) the Preds have used their first pick on a defenseman.

* Nashville hasn’t taken a goaltender since Anders Lindback. They chose they big Swede in the seventh round of the 2008 draft.

* The only time Nashville didn’t have a first round pick was in 2006. They ended up drafting Brentwood, Tennessee native Blake Geoffrion with their only choice in the first three rounds (2nd round, #56 overall).

* In 2009, Nashville chose Ryan Ellis at #11 overall. Ellis would go onto become one of the most — if not the most — decorated junior players in history.

* Arguably Nashville’s biggest draft bust was when they took goaltender Brian Finley #6 overall in 1999. Finley played just two games for Nashville, and then another two for Boston, before hanging up the skates for good in 2007.

* The only time Nashville has had multiple first round picks was in 2008. They had already selected Colin Wilson at #7 and they traded up to grab his childhood best friend, goaltender Chet Pickard at #18.

* In 2009, Nashville drafted a beast of a forward in 6’3”, 230 pound Zach Budish. Unfortunately (for both parties) Budish has hardly seen much ice time over the past three years due to multiple injuries.

Related Posts

About Jeremy K. Gover

Jeremy grew up in the Bay Area cheering for the Sharks since their inception. He moved to Nashville in September of 2005 and became a season ticket holder a day later. Thankfully, he no longer bleeds teal. You can e-mail Jeremy at jeremy@section303.com.

Facebook

Section303.com is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available from Section 303. -- Privacy Policy